God's Rookie of the Year


Book Description

Rodney is a teenager who got caught up in drugs and was helped by God-loving people. When he thought he could not be forgiven for his sin and no one could ever love him, he found Gods love by reading the Bible. Now he was torn between his love for baseball and God. He was invited to spring training with the New York Yankees, but he also wanted to preach. After each game, he walked the streets of New York, preaching on every corner. He drew huge crowds and converted so many people that pimps and drug dealers threatened his life and beat him in their attempt to get him off the streets. But Rodney would not stop preaching and was willing to die, if that was Gods will. The Yankees won the pennant, and Rodney was their starting pitcher in games one, four, and seven in the World Series. The death threats never stopped, and Rodney could have been killed at any time, but he was sure God would protect him. His courage and faith led thousands to Christ as a result. When the rapture came at the end of game seven, Rodney was the first to meet Jesus in the air, followed by thousands of others who were believers.




Whispers of the Gods


Book Description

"Anyone who has love for the game of baseball will enjoy this remarkable book." Library Journal, Starred Review In Whispers of the Gods, bestselling author Peter Golenbock brings to life baseball greats from the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s through timeless stories told straight from the players themselves. Like the enduring classic The Glory of Their Times, this book features the reminiscences of baseball legends, pulled from hundreds of hours of taped interviews with the author. Roy Campanella talks about life in the Negro Leagues before coming up to the Brooklyn Dodgers. Ted Williams recounts why he believes Shoeless Joe Jackson belongs in the Hall of Fame. Tom Sturdivant provides vivid memories of Casey Stengel, Mickey Mantle, and other Yankee icons. Other voices include Phil Rizzuto, Jim Bouton, Monte Irvin, Stan Musial, Ron Santo, Rex Barney, Ellis Clary, Roger Maris, Ed Froelich, Marty Marion, Jim Brosnan, Gene Conley, and Kirby Higbe. The players interviewed were All-Stars, Hall of Famers, and heroes to many, and their impact on the national pastime is still seen to this day. Baseball history comes alive through the stories shared in Whispers of the Gods, offering a fascinating account of the golden age of baseball.




God's Unlikely Path to Success


Book Description

When many Christian readers think of the heroes of the Bible, they think about how "good" they were. They forget that...Rahab was a harlot. Jonah was a rebel. Moses was a murderer. Sarah was a doubter. Peter was an apostate. Esther was a diva. Samson was a player. Jacob was a deceiver. And yet these eight men and women are among the Bible's greatest heroes. Dr. Tony Evans uses these prominent Bible characters to illustrate the truth that God delights in using imperfect people who have failed, sinned, or just plain blew it. These are men and women whose actions-or reactions-were not consistent with God's character-and yet God met them and used them in the midst of their mess. Readers will be encouraged about their own walk with God as they come to understand that He has them, too, on a path to success, despite their many imperfections and mistakes.




Turn Your Season Around


Book Description

For anyone ready to move their life forward, from tragedy, personal failure, unfair circumstances, or just a sense of being stuck, baseball legend and bestselling author Darryl Strawberry offers transformational practices and the tangible hope that you can enjoy a future filled with power, purpose, and freedom. Darryl Strawberry has seen it all--the highs and lows of an intense career as a Major League Baseball all-star, drug addiction, marriage challenges, prison time, and battles with cancer. With honesty and transparency, Strawberry shares the same foundational principles that transformed his life from the inside out--the power of prayer, cultivating healthy friendships, weathering trials without losing heart, refreshing the way you think, and letting God change your life for good. Ultimately, he'll help you discover and trust the redemptive process of making small, daily decisions to follow God into a life of faith, health, and freedom. Strawberry weaves compelling stories from his own life with those of others he met through his speaking and ministry work across the nation. These uplifting testimonies will inspire you with the reminder that God's power can renew any life, no matter what has happened. With scriptural insights and real-life examples, Strawberry celebrates the miracles God works in us for healing, cleansing, and new beginnings. Strawberry's life story is proof that you can overcome life's adversities one decision, one step at a time. It's time to turn your season around.




Gods' Games We Play, Vol. 1 (light novel)


Book Description

Let the games begin! In their (overabundance of) free time, the gods grew bored and decided to create challenging battles of wits to spice things up! Their opponent? Humanity! A select few players called “apostles” meet the gods on the spiritual realm’s playing field to beat the deities at their own games. A former god named Leshea has woken after sleeping for thousands of years, and her first demand is to meet “this era’s very best player!” She is introduced to Fay, an acclaimed rookie apostle. Together, they plan to challenge the gods and win the ultimate prize, but no one in human history has managed to clear ten games—because the gods can be capricious, outrageous, and sometimes downright incomprehensible! In the face of absurdity, what can the apostles do but enjoy the contest to its fullest?




If God Is Good


Book Description

Suffering is, in the end, God’s invitation to trust him. “As he did in his best-selling book, Heaven, Randy Alcorn delves deep into a profound subject, and through compelling stories, provocative questions and answers, and keen biblical understanding, he brings assurance and hope to all.” –Publishers Weekly Every one of us will experience suffering. You may be in such a time now. We see the presence of evil in the headlines every day. It all raises questions about God—Why would an all-good and all-powerful God create a world full of evil and suffering? How can there be a God if suffering and evil exist? Atheists such as Richard Dawkins and even former believers like Bart Ehrman answer the question simply: The existence of suffering and evil proves there is no God. But in this illuminating book, best-selling author Randy Alcorn challenges the logic of disbelief, and brings a fresh, hopeful, and thoroughly biblical insight to the issues these important questions raise. Alcorn offers insights from his conversations with men and women whose lives have been torn apart by suffering, and yet whose faith in God burns brighter than ever. He reveals the big picture of who God is and what God is doing in the world—now and forever. And he shows the beauty of God’s sovereignty—how it ultimately triumphs over suffering and evil in our lives and the world around us.




God Almighty Hisself


Book Description

When the Philadelphia Phillies signed Dick Allen in 1960, fans of the franchise envisioned bearing witness to feats never before accomplished by a Phillies player. A half-century later, they're still trying to make sense of what they saw. Carrying to the plate baseball's heaviest and loudest bat as well as the burden of being the club's first African American superstar, Allen found both hits and controversy with ease and regularity as he established himself as the premier individualist in a game that prided itself on conformity. As one of his managers observed, "I believe God Almighty hisself would have trouble handling Richie Allen." A brutal pregame fight with teammate Frank Thomas, a dogged determination to be compensated on par with the game's elite, an insistence on living life on his own terms and not management's: what did it all mean? Journalists and fans alike took sides with ferocity, and they take sides still. Despite talent that earned him Rookie of the Year and MVP honors as well as a reputation as one of his era's most feared power hitters, many remember Allen as one of the game's most destructive and divisive forces, while supporters insist that he is the best player not in the Hall of Fame. God Almighty Hisself: The Life and Legacy of Dick Allen explains why. Mitchell Nathanson presents Allen's life against the backdrop of organized baseball's continuing desegregation process. Drawing out the larger generational and business shifts in the game, he shows how Allen's career exposed not only the racial double standard that had become entrenched in the wake of the game's integration a generation earlier but also the forces that were bent on preserving the status quo. In the process, God Almighty Hisself unveils the strange and maddening career of a man who somehow managed to fulfill and frustrate expectations all at once.




Finding the Left Arm of God


Book Description

This is the story of the L.A. Dodgers' volatile fortunes during Sandy Koufax's transformation from a wild left-hander with a losing record on the verge of quitting the game, to an artist with exquisite control of the baseball--a veritable Mozart on the mound. From the Dodgers' sudden plunge into the baseball wilderness in 1960, to their return to pennant contention in Koufax's breakout year of 1961, through their catastrophic 1962 season--precipitated by Koufax's freak midseason finger injury--to their redemption in 1963 with their second World Championship on the West Coast, the narrative is set against the backdrop of John F. Kennedy's fleeting New Frontier presidency.




God with Us


Book Description

GOD WITH US is a commentary on the New Testament which communicates in an informal and sometimes humorous way some of the information and experiences the author has accumulated over a period of more than thirty years. Written in an easy-to-understand manner, it requires no knowledge of Greek and Hebrew to read, thus making it an excellent addition to the library of not only pastors, but Sunday School teachers and other lay persons as well.




Knowing the Face of God, Revised Edition


Book Description

There is no deeper, more intense human longing than to know God is real and to see Him face to face.Ó In some circles, having a personal relationship with GodÓ is synonymous with being a Christian. We are told, in fact, that we 'must' have such a relationship if we are truly God's children. But if we are honest, says Tim Stafford, we must admit that often there is a considerable gap between our talk and our experience. We want to know God. The problem is that we don't know how to know Him. How do we know God personally?Ó After examining the traditional answers and finding their shortcomings for himself, Stafford began his own search for the means to knowing, personally, a personal God. 'Knowing the Face of God' is the moving record of his quest.